S’porean jailed for illegal registration of pre-paid SIM cards using false identities

SINGAPORE — A 42-year-old Singaporean was sentenced to four years’ jail on Thursday (July 21) for illegally changing and registering subscriber information on pre-paid SIM cards belonging to the three telcos in Singapore.

Tan Kong Chieh had pleaded guilty to 220 of the proceeded charges under the Computer Misuse and Cybersecurity Act, while another 440 charges were taken into consideration during sentencing.

His offences took place between 2010 and 2012, when he ran a business selling SIM cards to other retailers on a freelance basis.

The court heard that in 2005, he began “pre-registering” pre-paid SIM cards. This involves him registering the SIM card before selling it, by using the identity of an individual who was not the eventual buyer of the card.

These pre-registered cards were then put up for sale and could be used by those who want to remain anonymous, since the cards would not be traced back to them.

Tan was aware of the registration requirements and had difficulty finding people who were willing to provide their personal particulars for what he wanted to do.

Sometime in 2008 or 2009, he approached a tour agency in China and bought scanned copies of passports to register the pre-paid SIM cards.

Investigations revealed that between 2010 and 2012, Tan used the particulars of these passport holders to register the pre-paid SIM cards with the three telcos.

New regulatory controls for such SIM cards, including the need to record personal particulars for each registration, were introduced in 2005 after it was found that terrorists were taught to use these cards to communicate with each other without being detected.

In 2014, the rules were tightened further to limit the number of pre-paid SIM cards each person can hold to three, instead of the previous 10.

In asking for a sentence of four to five years imprisonment, the prosecution noted the strong need to deter telecommunications retailers and their employees from abusing their access to the computer systems that hold registration information for pre-paid SIM cards.

These cards are still being sold openly online, often at a premium, such as S$95 for a pre-registered pre-paid SIM card with a stored value of S$50, the prosecution said.

There were also aggravating factors, such as how Tan’s actions directly resulted in facilitating unlicensed moneylending offences and inconveniencing innocent persons.

In asking for the jail term for Tan, Deputy Public Prosecutor Sanjiv Vaswani said that a strong message needs to be sent out to anyone thinking of illegally registering SIM cards. “If you do so, you are effectively registering yourself for a stay in Changi Prison,” he added.

District Judge Michelle Yap noted that Tan was a recalcitrant offender who persisted in his offending acts. There was also a “high degree of planning and premeditation” where, after he exhausted his contacts who were willing to provide their particulars, he bought scanned copies of passport images of unsuspecting persons.

Tan’s “illegal business” could be said to be of a large scale, District Judge Yap said when meting out the stiff sentence.